


The Man From F.O.W.L.

by Mighty_Ant



Category: Darkwing Duck (Cartoon 1991), DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Fethry joins F.O.W.L. AU, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Mild marine biology, Minor Violence, Mutual Pining, Set Pre and Post-In Double-O-Duck You Only Crash Twice, Steelbeak backstory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:28:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23763844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mighty_Ant/pseuds/Mighty_Ant
Summary: “Fethry Duck is cut from a different cloth than the rest of clan McDuck,” Bradford said, letting his glare linger on Steelbeak. “To put it simply, heisan idiot. Either he turns out to be a valuable hostage or we dispose of him like the rest of them. Your job is to keep him in the lab, happy and oblivious. I’m sure even you can manage that.”Steelbeak is assigned what should be simple guard duty, but doesn't expect to develop feelings for F.O.W.L.'s latest asset.
Relationships: Fethry Duck/Steelbeak
Comments: 39
Kudos: 244





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Shout out to [zara2148](https://zara2148.tumblr.com/post/615333309584736256/so-i-was-thinking-about-the-fethry-and-steelbeak/)  
> for the Fethry in F.O.W.L. AU!

“What’s with these little guys?” 

While the lab was always cluttered, it was normally cluttered with scientific equipment and charts that Steelbeak didn’t know the names of and couldn’t parse heads or tails of anyway. In the last two months, Fethry’s addition to the lab brought more of the same, but at least his charts were colorful. A large jar full of water and tiny swimming creatures was incongruous, to say the least. 

“Oh, that’s my team!”

He glanced past the jar at Fethry, who beamed at him from the other side of the table. “Your team?” he repeated, confused. 

Fethry nodded eagerly. “I found them back when I worked in the McDuck Sublab. They’ve been my stalwart companions going on...oh, about five years now.” 

“What are they, shrimp?” Steelbeak asked. 

_“Euphausia_ superba,” he replied, “more commonly known as the Antarctic krill! They were invaluable in my unofficial research, and I figured they could help me out here now that I‘ve got a real lab coat and a new underwater lab!” Fethry tugged on his lapels with a grin, one of his sleeves stained with ink from a particularly irritable squid, only to thoughtfully add, “Well, underwater _and_ underground lab, technically. All of the ‘unders’.”

Steelbeak blinked. “So they’re like super krill or something?”

“Exactly!” Fethry enthused. “I’ve been training them since they hatched, and they’ve learned to follow simple commands and swim in formation. I’d be lost without them.” He came around the table to stand beside Steelbeak and began pointing out individual krill. After a moment of hesitation, Steelbeak leaned down with him so their faces were level. 

“Let’s see, we have the ever feisty Hans, Dr. Krill—he’s currently arguing his dissertation—Benji, Alastair, Nicholas, little Beverly, Virgil, Simone, Fish Breath, Philippe’s right there, Cameron, Sylvia, and Charles! Oh, and Mitzy, but she’s no longer with us.”

Steelbeak turned to Fethry, his brow furrowing. “What happened to Mitzy?”

“Hm?” Fethry said distractedly. “Oh! Oh, no, she’s fine! She’s just too big to fit in the same jar as the rest of the team. You know the giant krill in the bay? That’s Mitzy!”

“Huh,” Steelbeak said, leaning back. 

Fethry bounced a little on his heels, clasping his hands together. “Oh, and that isn’t even the best part!” He hurried back to the other side of the lab, where the light switch was. “My whole team was mutated by the chemicals in the hydrothermal vents near where I found them. Mitzy’s mutation was the most obvious, but Mother Nature is a tricky customer and she gave the rest of my team a little something, too.

“Behold!” he announced, flipping the light switch and plunging the lab into darkness. Although, not completely. The jar of krill glowed brilliant blue like a lantern, almost otherworldly in its intensity. Steelbeak gasped in spite of himself. 

“My team’s natural bioluminescence was increased a thousandfold,” Fethry explained, his voice hushed as he stepped up to the other side of the table. “They’ve helped light my way through some dark times, let me tell you.” 

Once more, Steelbeak looked past the jar and to Fethry on the other side. He found himself arrested by the play of light across Fethry’s features, the jar’s pale blue glow highlighting the delicate curves of his face and throat, so unlike the sharp panes of his own. A clever quip caught in his chest, along with his next breath. 

“They’re really something,” Steelbeak found himself saying, stupidly. 

“Aren’t they?” Fethry’s voice was awed. 

A series of crashes in the darkness had them startling apart, to Steelbeak’s overwhelming relief. His chest was still feeling tight and though he could tell himself otherwise, the racing of his heart had nothing to do with the potential of an intruder. Mechanically, he prepared for an attack and moved to shield Fethry from view. If memory served, there were a handful of syringes in the drawer to his right and a heavy microscope on the table next to him that he could use to bludgeon someone's head in if need be. He was only a little disappointed when he recognized the affronted voice coming from the general direction of the doorway. 

“What in the—what the devil happened to the lights?”

Fethry winced. “Sorry about that, Dr. Heron.”   
  
  
  


With all active agents gathered around the conference table or calling in from various clandestine locations, their biweekly mission debriefings could almost be mistaken for the corporate drudgery of a regular office job. That is, if those meetings also entailed kill orders against foreign dignitaries and instructions for which sleeper agent they were to be replaced with. Hell, maybe that _was_ what happened. It wasn’t as though Steelbeak had ever held anyone’s idea of a regular job. 

It was their first debriefing in the new base beneath Funzo’s and he listened with only half an ear, still sore about the loss of the satellighthouse. Blot was being given a break from sentry duty to do something sinister in Rongway, Dee was to work on new surveillance equipment, so on and so forth. He didn’t start paying too much attention until Bradford said his name. 

“Heron, you and Steelbeak will be stationed here for the foreseeable future. We’ll be acquiring a new asset tomorrow who must be kept in the dark regarding the true intentions of our operation.” 

“You’re bringing a civilian here?” Heron demanded. “What on earth for?”

“Because he makes a convenient hostage,” Bradford replied shortly. With the press of a button, the massive screen behind him flickered and an image of a duck wearing a red beanie, jacket, and yellow sweater appeared, smiling blithely at the camera. 

“This is Fethry Duck, nephew of Scrooge McDuck. He’s a marine biologist who’s been looking for a research lab willing to hire a scientist without a degree or qualifications of any kind.” He smiled, a small, sharp thing that lasted little more than a second on his dour face. “We told him that F.L.O.W., the Federation of Leading Ocean Wayfarers, would be happy to have him.”

Steelbeak snorted. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.” 

While sitting down Bradford was even shorter than most people in the room, he still managed to peer _down_ at Steelbeak like he was a particularly ugly bug he’d found under his shoe. Steelbeak tried not to feel too special; Bradford looked at everyone like that. “Excuse me?” he said icily

“F.L.O.W? A little on the nose, ain’t it?” Steelbeak said, gesturing flippantly at the image of the duck smiling benignly on the screen. “Like what idiot’s gonna buy that?”

“Fethry Duck is cut from a different cloth than the rest of clan McDuck,” Bradford said, letting his glare linger on Steelbeak. “To put it simply, he _is_ an idiot. Either he turns out to be a valuable hostage or we dispose of him like the rest of them. Your job is to keep him in the lab, happy and oblivious. I’m sure even you can manage that.”

“You have nothing to worry about, Bradford,” Heron replied, shooting Steelbeak a quelling look. 

He raised his hands defensively, leaning back in his seat. As the conversation continued around him, he considered the asset’s still image. 

Fethry Duck, huh? 

He supposed a babysitting job wouldn’t be too bad. Plus, he’d be able to place bets with the Eggheads to see how long Heron would let an outsider mess with her lab equipment before she snapped and just blasted the poor sap. 

  
  
  
  


With few options for entertainment on base, and even less outside of it as a former convict, Steelbeak tended to frequent the lab in between missions. The week following their last debriefing found him doing just that. 

He was messing with the big boxy device that spun around on the inside on Heron’s Touch-This-And-I’ll-Use-You-As-My-Next-Test-Subject table when he heard voices out in the hall. 

“What a setup! If I’d realized this place was so top secret I would’ve—well I wouldn’t have turned you guys down, far from it, I’m very grateful! How far down are we, by the way? The elevator was quick but I know when I’m traveling below sea level. Are we underwater now? There don’t seem to be any windows so I’m guessing we’re even further down. Underground then? Am I talking too much? I’m sorry about that.” 

Heron stomped through the doorway of the lab with a pinched expression of such utter fury on her face that Steelbeak had to disguise his snort of laughter as a cough, raising a fist to his beak to sell the charade. Her resulting glare was venomous, but he didn’t have long to be amused by it before the source of her ire followed her. 

Fethry Duck looked much like he did in his photo, only more cheerful. He entered the lab with his head on a swivel, taking in Heron’s dour setup with undisguised awe. His clothes were baggy, and he didn’t resemble what Steelbeak had come to expect scientists to look like. 

Heron stormed past Steelbeak and grabbed a handful of the explosive ammunition she used in her prosthesis from her Touch-This-And-You-Won’t-Live-To-See-Retirement table. “You two idiots entertain yourselves,” she muttered, for Steelbeak’s ears only. “I’m going to the firing range.”

He bristled at the insult, but he told himself not to take it to heart. His partner was notorious for not tolerating fools lightly, and if what Bradford said was true, this Fethry Duck was the biggest fool of all. 

“Thank you for showing me the way to the lab, Dr. Heron,” Fethry said, beaming, as she walked back in his direction. “I’m looking forward to working with—” Heron marched past him without so much as a sideways glance and he trailed off, watching her go. “Oh. I guess I _was_ talking too much.”

Steelbeak was debating how much bodily harm he was risking in following Heron when their oblivious hostage wasted no time in approaching him, arm extended for a handshake. 

“Hello there!” he said, seemingly unbothered by Steelbeak’s refusal to uncross his arms. “I’m Fethry Duck. Are you a scientist too?” 

He instinctively saw red, his hands curling into fists. Asset or not, Steelbeak didn’t take kindly to being mocked, much less twice in the span of a minute and much _much_ less by one of the Ducks. But his brain caught up to the rest of his body when he processed the way Fethry continued to hold his gaze, expression sincere and unflinching. He was actually serious. 

Feeling as though he’d missed a step on a set of stairs and trying not to show it, Steelbeak scoffed. “As if I’d be into this nerd stuff. No I’m, uh, I’m lab security. So you’ll be seeing a lot of me.” He said the last part as a challenge. 

Fethry lowered his hand but not his smile. He began examining the materials on Heron’s Touch-This-And-I’ll-Replace-Your-Beak-With-One-Made-Out-Of-Styrofoam-Steelbeak table. “Well then, it’ll be nice to see a friendly face! I haven’t met anyone but you and Dr. Heron, Mr…?” 

“Steelbeak,” he replied. 

Fethry laughed, delighted. “It certainly is,” he said, wandering back and peering up at Steelbeak with a lack of fear he hadn’t experienced in years. “I’m no engineer, but even I can tell that your beak’s expertly made. Kind of like Dr. Heron’s arm. Oh, did she make it for you?” 

Steelbeak took a step back without meaning to, unnerved by Fethry’s earnestness. He hadn’t known what to expect from a new scientist, official credited or not; maybe someone haughty and cruel like Heron or timid like the base’s other scientists. His instincts told him that the all-smiles routine was just that, an act, and it put him on the defensive when he was supposed to be putting their hostage at ease. 

Fethry blinked, exuberance faltering for the first time. “I’m sorry, I got a little carried away, didn’t I?” he said, his smile shrinking. He took a step back, clasping his hands together. “I’m just excited to start working with you all. This’ll be my first official research job, y’know! Not just something I do to while away the hours as I stare into the unending abyss.”

“Huh?” Steelbeak said 

“Do you know if I’ve been assigned to a specific part of the lab?” Fethry asked, his cheer startlingly buoyant. “Or is it more of a first come first served kind of thing?” 

Steelbeak glanced around for just a moment before pointing at Heron’s Touch-This-And-I’ll-Use-You-As-My-Next-Test-Subject table. “Nobody’s using that one. Go right ahead.”

  
  
  


A month after meeting Fethry’s team, the scientist in question nervously sidled up to him in the lab one morning. 

It was just the two of them, as had increasingly become the case since Heron started conducting more live animal experimentation in her personal lab. Fethry had a row of fish tanks against his side of the lab, filled with everything from colorful algae to a perpetually angry octopus. Weeks ago, he started offering to let Steelbeak feed the piranhas while he documented their behavior, an offer Steelbeak always took him up on. 

That morning, he was distracted from watching the piranhas tear apart a handful of thawed bait fish when Fethry hardly said a word for the duration of his notetaking. Normally, silence was rare in the lab when Fethry was in residence, as he could talk at length about any and every species, the body of water of their origin, and the personalities of the ones he’d had the pleasure of meeting.

However, while Fethry might’ve been silent, he certainly wasn’t motionless. He twirled his pen around his fingers like a magician might a playing card, and every few minutes moved to stand a little bit closer. Not only that, but he was chewing on a corner of his beak in a display of nervousness that Steelbeak had never seen from him. It immediately put him on the defensive as he became more and more certain that he was doing something wrong. 

“What is it?” he snapped, burning hotly with embarrassment beneath the collar of his bespoke suit. Heron never had any problem listing his many faults; maybe Fethry just needed prompting. 

Fethry jumped, dropping his pen. “Oh, sorry,” he said, grinning sheepishly. He bent down to retrieve it. “Nervous habit, I guess.” Pen in hand, he tapped the edge of his clipboard a few times, looking down at the ground. “After feeding our sharped-toothed friends here I was planning on getting some fresh air. The tide pools by the abandoned amphitheater supposedly have, uh, albino hermit crabs so I was gonna check that out. If...if you wanted to-to join me.”

Steelbeak’s instinctive response was to suspect a trap. Back when he was in deep with the St. Canard underground fighting circuit, there was a particular spot down by the docks with no police and less witnesses where the more prestigious gangs liked to dump bodies. The amphitheater was the ideal setting for such an ambush; secluded, empty, and hard to reach. 

With some difficulty, he stamped down the worst of his paranoia. This was _Fethry_ he was talking about. For all intents and purposes the least dangerous member of Clan McDuck until the day he decided to take Mitzy for a walk downtown. Besides, in the unlikely event Fethry did try anything, it wasn’t as if Steelbeak couldn’t take him in a fight. 

He tried not to think about how the thought of laying a hand on Fethry in any fashion made him sick to his stomach. 

The speed with which Fethry tapped his pen against his clipboard reached new heights in the wake of Steelbeak’s prolonged silence. “I understand if you’re busy,” he said in a rush, “it’s not very interesting, I know—”

“Sure, why not,” Steelbeak replied, trying to remain aloof as he moved for the first time in almost a minute, dropping a few more pieces of bait fish in the piranha tank. 

“What—really?” 

Steelbeak made the mistake of glancing down at Fethry and was floored by the brilliant, disbelieving smile on his face. Heat prickled under his collar again, this time from a different sort of embarrassment. “Uh, yeah,” he said. He sniffed and quickly glanced away. “Nothing better to do in here anyway. Might as well get some air.”

“Oh, o-of course,” Fethry replied. When Steelbeak risked another glimpse, he saw Fethry failing to hide a smile as he busied himself with note taking. 

After a quick check-in at the actual security room, Steelbeak returned to the lab so he and Fethry could set out for the passageway that opened up into the amphitheater. The base had dozens of tunnels just like it, sprawling out to various strategic points all over town, but Fethry obviously knew of only a scant few of them, if that. 

Before they left, he was a little surprised when Fethry pulled off his baggy lab coat—at two sizes too big he always rolled the sleeves up—to reveal a close-fitting gray turtleneck that, aside from fitting Fethry properly, also looked brand new. In all the time Steelbeak had known him, he always wore well-worn, oversized clothes: an old Duckburg U sweatshirt, for example, or his trademark yellow sweater. 

Steelbeak dressed in the most expensive suits he could get his hands on, wanting to make his rise in status obvious to anyone who looked at him. He wasn’t the same punk who cops dragged kicking and screaming out of the ring, beak warped and face beaten bloody. He was an agent of F.O.W.L., not a henchman or a mobster’s pawn. But Fethry had never shown such concern for his appearance, and Steelbeak eyed him discreetly, wondering what had changed. 

Obviously he wasn’t discreet enough, as Fethry’s natural smile became a bit abashed as he hid his turtleneck under a red coat that also seemed to be new. “Oh, uh, Della, my cousin, took me on a bit of a shopping spree when she heard about my new job. Don’t worry, I didn’t tell her anything about any of this,” he added quickly, and Steelbeak was a little embarrassed to admit that the risk of a potential security breach hadn’t even crossed his mind. “She said that after being on the moon so long she needed a new wardrobe and that I couldn’t keep wearing ‘grandpa clothes’.”

Steelbeak stuffed his hands in his pockets as they started walking down the hall. “Well, uh, you look good,” he said stiffly. “But you looked fine before, too.” 

Fethry stopped in his tracks. Steelbeak almost turned around to check on him before he hurried to catch up. “Thanks,” he said, and Steelbeak could hear the smile in his voice (and he wondered when that became something he recognized). “You always look very nice, you know! Very snazzy.”

Steelbeak laughed as he stopped to enter the code in the control panel to open the passageway. A strange, warm feeling settled over him, fluttering under his rib cage, and it took him several seconds to recognize this particular thrill. Flattery. He was _flattered_. “What, this old thing?” he said, tugging smugly at his lapel as the entrance slid open.

At first, the passage on the other side of the door stretched out into darkness; standing at the entrance, it was akin to peering down a predator’s gullet. After a few seconds the fluorescent lights kicked on, spaced out every five feet on the metal ceiling. The tunnel was wide enough for Steelbeak and Fethry to walk side by side and once they entered, the doorway sealed shut behind them. 

  
  


The crisp breeze blowing off the bay came as a bit of a shock, and Steelbeak wondered if he’d been shut up in the base for too long. 

Wind whistled hauntingly through the crumbling walls of the amphitheater and above them the sky was pale blue, peppered with clouds. Sitting on one of the collapsed pillars decorating the weathered wooden stage, Steelbeak watched Fethry wander through the tide pools surrounding the base of the flooded amphitheater. The sheer breadth of the space was almost disconcerting. In front of him the bay stretched out endlessly and the air was tinged by salt and smoke and a million others things, bracing in a way the stale, recycled kind in the base never could be. 

F.O.W.L. might have freed him from prison but sometimes it felt as though he’d just been placed in another box, this one with gilded wrapping. Or perhaps _steel,_ he amended as the pale sunlight glinted dully off his beak. 

Fortunately, Fethry chose that moment to interrupt the bleak turn his thoughts had taken. 

“So….Steelbeak,” he said, standing in knee deep water. “Is there a first name to go with that?”

He smirked. “How do you know Steelbeak isn’t my first name?” 

Fethry started, then shook his head with a laugh. “You got me there.”

“Speaking of names,” Steelbeak said. He hesitated, knowing he was getting into dangerous territory. As usual, he plowed ahead blindly. “You’re related to McDuck, right?”

He didn’t expect the smile to slip off Fethry’s face. “Not really,” he replied, with a meager attempt at his usual cheer. “I’m just his...sister’s husband’s nephew,” he said, counting off on his fingers. 

“Still,” Steelbeak countered, “that’s more than most idiots can say. Richest duck in the world’s gotta need fancy science guys too. Why not hit him up for a job? You worked for him before, right?”

These were the sort of questions he wasn’t supposed to ask. He hadn’t exactly been handed _How to Be A Spy For Dummies_ but even he knew that introducing doubt to a hostage who came to them willingly was a capital ‘b’ Bad idea. Time was, he wouldn’t have cared enough to ask; what were the McDucks if not a means to an end? But this was _Fethry_. He wanted to know what could possibly drive someone to F.O.W.L. when for him it was a choice between espionage and prison. 

Fethry chuckled without humor, rubbing the back of his neck. “Well uh, isn’t that a whale of a tale.” 

Steelbeak’s brow furrowed in confusion. Ambiguity was hardly Fethry’s M.O., quite the opposite in fact. He was able to relax around Fethry because he didn’t feel like he was lagging six steps behind when they had a conversation. 

Fethry resumed his perusal of the tide pools, notably lacking in his earlier exuberance. “The last time I worked for Uncle Scrooge it ended a little abruptly,” he said, his voice carefully even. 

“You were fired?” 

“In a manner of speaking,” Fethry said, crouching to inspect something beneath the surface of the water. “The lab was old. Coupled with the hydrothermal vents, it was only a matter of time before it fell apart. I still haven’t told Donald or Uncle Scrooge. And Della thinks we were all one big happy family while she was gone, so...” He shook his head with a chagrined smile.

“I don’t get it,” Steelbeak said, the words slipping out before he could stop them. What might have once garnered mocking laughter or one of Heron’s eye-rolls only made Fethry straighten with a sigh. 

“I’m not doing a very good job of explaining this,” he admitted, shooting Steelbeak a small, apologetic smile as he scratched his forehead. “Okay,” he said at last, nodding decisively. “For four years, I took care of Uncle Scrooge’s lab. I wasn’t a scientist or anything, I just...kept it running. It was just me and the wonders of the deep, out in the middle of the ocean and most of the time it was amazing! Everything I’d ever dreamed of, y’know? But it was just me. And I was worried that if I went back to Uncle Scrooge he’d just stick me in some other dark, empty place and forget all about me.”

The image of Fethry’s bright light smothered by an oppressive darkness didn’t sit right with Steelbeak. Entirely the opposite, really, as the notion curdled in Steelbeak’s gut like spoiled milk. 

“What about F.O.—F.L.O.W.? Isn’t this just the same thing?” he asked, and realized as soon as the words were out of his mouth that he was dreading the answer. 

Fethry blinked. “Of course not. You’re here.”

Steelbeak’s train of thought screeched to a halt, the cars crashed together and the coal cart caught fire. 

“What?” he said.

“I’m doing this all wrong aren’t I?” Fethry muttered, raising a hand to his face. 

Steelbeak stiffened, a familiar paranoia rising to choke him. He was on the brink of searching for signs of an ambush when Fethry exclaimed, “I don’t know if there are albino hermit crabs in these tide pools!” He threw his hands out at his sides. “They’re not why I’m out here. Or why I asked you to come with me. I just...I wanted to spend time with you outside of the lab.” Fethry looked up at him, expression imploring and a little bit hopeful, as the water lapped gently around his knees. Steelbeak felt heat rise up his neck, flooding his face. The silence became overwhelming and he couldn’t think of a single pithy comment. 

“I went to prison,” he blurted. 

Fethry’s eyes widened sharply in surprise. 

“Nine months,” Steelbeak went on, his beak moving independent of his mind furiously demanding that he _shut. The hell. Up._ “It was supposed to be longer but F-F.L.O.W. got me out early.”

“Steelbeak,” Fethry said, his dark brow furrowing in concern as he started making his way to the stage. “You don’t have you—”

“I’m on parole,” he said, wincing through the lie. “That’s why I’m here. Before you get any ideas about making us friendship bracelets.”

Fethry stopped at the edge of the wooden stage, which reached him just below his waist. He didn’t look angry or scared like Steelbeak had intended. “Thank you for telling me,” he said, smiling that infuriatingly gentle smile. “You didn’t have to do that, and I want you to know that it doesn’t change my opinion of you.” 

“What? Why not?” Steelbeak demanded, throwing himself to his feet. 

Fethry clambered onto the stage with a grunt of exertion. “Well—” 

His foot slipped. 

Before Steelbeak was conscious of moving, he lunged forward the moment Fethry started tipping backward. He grabbed Fethry by one flailing wrist and dragged him forward to safety. That just so happened put him on a collision course with Steelbeak’s chest. 

For one breathless moment, their bodies were pressed flush against one another. Steelbeak burned all over and couldn’t draw breath, much less look away from Fethry’s upturned face, his beak parted in an expression of perfect shock. He felt the rise and fall of Fethry’s smaller chest against his own, and he choked on his own exhale. His grip remained ironclad around Fethry’s wrist, locked still like a statue, and in spite of that he felt Fethry’s hands settle against his waist, pressing gently.

It was too much. 

“I should be getting back,” Steelbeak stuttered, tearing himself away. He didn’t look at Fethry as he stumbled, stopped and finally turned around, making a beeline for the tunnel that would return him to base. 

He left Fethry alone on the stage without looking back. 

  
  
  


Black Heron greeted him almost the instant he crossed the threshold. 

“Did you leave the premises with the asset?” she hissed at him in the hallway, enraged in a way that went far beyond her typical ire. 

“Yeah, so what?” he retorted, still shaken by what transpired in the amphitheater. “He wanted to do some science thing by the water.” 

He would later blame her augmented prosthesis for the way he didn’t even realize she’d moved until she'd already grabbed his beak. She used her enhanced strength and his surprise to yank him down to her eye level. Her unyielding talons screeched against the steel, sealing it shut.“You idiot! Don't you realize you could’ve exposed us? What if one of his insipid family members had seen you?” 

Startled and enraged at being brought to heel so easily, he jerked his beak out of her grasp. “I checked the security monitors, Heron,” he snapped. “McDuck and them are in Egypt and the green cousin won tickets to some resort in Birdbados. I’m not _stupid_.”

Heron sneered. “Not this time.” She shoved past him, starting down the hall with her beak in the air. When she stopped only a handful of feet away, he knew to be on the defensive. Instead, what she said chilled him. “Oh, and next time you decide to mix business with pleasure, try to be a little more discreet,” she threw over her shoulder, making no effort to hide her smirk. “After all, Fethry Duck won’t be here for long.” 


	2. Chapter 2

Steelbeak was awoken by nightmares more often than not. 

He had visions of being thrown down a deep dark hole with no end in sight as bars descended over the opening. He felt the pain of his beak fracturing over and over again, and relived his drugged, panicked awakening on Heron’s operating table, his wrists bound and his face aflame, weighed down by some gleaming, foreign entity. 

Not to say he didn’t have normal dreams about being a celebrity guest on his favorite cooking show he’d never admit to watching, trading blows in the ring with a cheering crowd at his back, or showing up to his own court hearing in nothing but a pair of boxers. He tended to go a few weeks before the nightmare resurfaced, the same every time. This was his norm in the year since he joined F.O.W.L. 

Then one night, the nightmare changed. 

An unseen force shoved him into a deep hole, but as he fell red began to seep through the walls around him, as though he’d been plunged into a darkroom. He landed at Heron’s feet, his feathers and his suit and his beak positively weeping red. She grabbed him by the beak, as she was increasingly wont to do, and yanked him to his feet. 

“He won’t be here for long,” she said. 

Steelbeak saw Fethry, standing behind his lab table in an empty red, red room. As he did every morning, Fethry looked up at him with a smile already on his face, soft and a little surprised to see him, as though he expected Steelbeak to have decided to leave between one day and the next.

He held out his hand and Fethry didn’t hesitate before reaching for him, slipping his smaller hand into Steelbeak’s crimson grip. Like an infection, he watched the red bleed up into Fethry’s white feathers from that single point of contact. 

He couldn’t let go of Fethry’s hand and his beak refused to open, refused to warn him, as the red spread along Fethry’s arms and down his chest until finally it started creeping viselike up his throat. But Fethry wouldn’t stop smiling that stupid fond smile that made Steelbeak’s chest feel as though it was catching fire and caving in at the same time, and he wouldn’t let go of Steelbeak’s hand.

He was helpless to do anything but watch as the red crept up Fethry’s face and into his kind eyes, swallowing him whole. 

Steelbeak awoke, sweat-drenched and gasping, amid tangled, thousand thread-count sheets in a hotel room more lavish than anything he could have imagined before F.O.W.L. He looked out the window to where Algiers glittered under a black starless sky. He and Heron had been dispatched to meet with some arms dealer in the morning. 

He slumped back against his pillows with a heavy sigh, running a hand down his face. “Just a dream,” he muttered. “Good thing those never mean anything.” 

  
  
  
  


Fethry Duck was...weird. 

And not because he sang to his krill, complimented every specimen he brought into the lab, and kept a two hundred foot tall sea monster as a pet. He was weird because he was _kind_ , probably kinder than anyone Steelbeak had ever met. Although even he knew that wasn’t saying much when his social circles tended to include underground fighting rings, prison inmates, and now literal spies. 

From a young age, it had been drilled into him the kindness was weakness and weakness got you killed. The starving kid who stole food for their friend was the one who got caught. The fighter who let up on their opponent because they’d just shattered half his face was the whose neck was broken getting thrown out of the ring. The inmate sitting in a cell with a cheap plastic prosthesis and ten years left on his sentence would end up right back where he started if he refused the offer of a mysterious woman in a red dress and wicked robot arm to remake him, as long as he didn’t mind getting his hands dirty. 

Fethry wasn’t here for money, though F.O.W.L. certainly could’ve forked it over in spades. He wasn’t here for acclaim or revenge or a chance at a new life. He was here to chart the effects of tidal lock on the nearby reef, to coo over a deadly lionfish, and take samples of Mitzy’s DNA to isolate what chemical made her grow to such kaiju-like proportions. F.O.W.L. was giving him the opportunity to do what he loved, as he would often profess. 

In theory, all of that just made Fethry out to be a normal guy. Not a S.H.U.S.H. turncoat from the 1960s, a punk rock scientist that could shoot lightning out of her hands, or an Old West billionaire frozen in ice, to name a few. However, even as distanced from normal as Steelbeak was, he knew that wasn’t the case with Fethry. 

For starters, a normal guy would be afraid of Steelbeak. He knew for a fact that he cut an intimidating figure even before the beak. Yet from the moment of their meeting Fethry had been anything but scared of him. Inviting Steelbeak into his lab space with open arms, clamoring to show him his findings and explain them at great length without Steelbeak having to ask and most strangely, without making him feel like a colossal waste of space when he didn’t understand.

At first, it made guard duty not just bearable but almost enjoyable. Until...well. Until he started to enjoy Fethry’s company too much, taking risks he shouldn’t have taken; that sojourn to the amphitheater, first and foremost. 

Fethry’s smile made him forget who he was and more importantly, who he worked for. Steelbeak was a fighter in a den of spies and if he wanted them to respect him, he had to prove himself one of them. That meant doing his job without distraction, not risking the secrecy of their organization, and not getting attached to their assets. 

Fethry Duck could be dead in a week, and he just had to accept that. 

Steelbeak and Heron were assigned on a slew of missions abroad not long after the amphitheater fiasco, securing contacts and weapons caches and all sorts of other spy stuff. Fethry was moved into quarters on base so that F.O.W.L. could keep an eye on him while Steelbeak was gone. 

He knew he should be grateful for the change in scenery. Before F.O.W.L., he’d never so much as left St. Canard to buy a pack of smokes. No reason to, not when it held the highest ranking fight rings in Calisota. Now he found himself flying all over the world in a private jet, visited the glistening casinos of Macaw, dingy back rooms in Copenhenan, and the snow white beaches of Monte Crow. He wore suits more expensive than anything he’d ever owned and stared down fat cats the likes of which would have owned _him_ scarcely more than a year go. 

As fortunate as Steelbeak knew he was, he found it increasingly difficult to stay focused on the repetitive back and forth their spy work entailed. He’d be putting the screws to a mole in the back of a bar in Little Tokyolk and would find himself thinking about the curve of Fethry’s smile as he rhapsodized about the longevity of lobsters. Pummeling some would-be mob boss’ henchmen, he’d be reminded of the arc of Fethry’s hands through the air as he gestured while speaking. Fethry’s smooth, gentle singing voice was more of an earworm than any vapid pop song on the radio. 

It didn’t help matters that Heron, his partner, refused to let him take point on any of their assignments. He was relegated to the position of bodyguard, her silent shadow, in practically all of their exchanges with F.O.W.L. contacts or weapons dealers looking to make a quick buck. 

They were in Atloonta when she cut him off in the middle of a handshake with some local crime lord. Steelbeak rounded on her the instant they were the only ones in the room. 

“I mean it, Heron! Stop trying to undermine me.” He got in her space, used his bulk against her and jabbed a finger in her face. Men larger than _him_ had quailed under the same treatment. 

Heron hardly looked up from the open file in her hands. She laughed, snorted really, as she maneuvered around him to her desk in their latest impromptu office, where they met with various buyers and sellers in anonymity. “Undermine you?” she repeated, propping her feet up on her desk. “Have you forgotten who was put in charge of this assignment? In case you needed a reminder, it wasn’t you.” 

Steelbeak growled, following Heron so that he could loom over her from her desk. “Yeah, but I can do more, y’know! I can be in charge of meetings with the moneybags, take point on an assignment, all that spy stuff. I don’t just have to be the muscle.”

Heron finally tore her eyes off the file in her hands, putting it facedown before she pushed away from her desk. She stood without a trace of hesitance and patted his cheek with a simpering smile. “Why would I do that when you play the part of idiotic stooge so well?”

Fury came as easily to Steelbeak as breathing, and he summoned a burning lungful from his ample reserve. Heron was always doing this, using the big words in her insults that his limited schooling failed to teach him, and a lifetime of blows to the head would’ve knocked clean out of his ears anyway. Despite the exact definition being lost on him, he gathered what she meant. 

“Are you calling me stupid?” It was quiet, measured for him, and he didn’t even knock anything off her desk. While cutthroat, this wasn’t the world he’d left behind. Heron was his partner; he’d give her the benefit of the doubt. 

Heron walked around him again, now in the direction of the briefcase stuffed with cash their latest customer had left with them. “No, I believe you just did,” she replied with a hum. 

“C’mon, Heron!” he snapped, throwing his hands in the air. “You didn’t spring me from solitary confinement, give me these new threads and fix my face if all you wanted me to do was stand around looking scary! You know that I could be doing more! In fact, I think—” 

Lightning-quick, Heron’s prosthetic claw launched across the room and wrapped around his beak, clamping it shut in a punishing grip. Once its hold was secure her wrist retracted, sending Steelbeak tripping over his feet as it yanked him ten feet forward to look Heron straight in the eye. “Shut. Up.” She spoke with painful slowness, as one did to a particularly dimwitted child. Heron didn’t release his beak and he knew better than to attempt freeing himself if he wanted to keep it attached to his face. Silent and simmering, he glared down at her. “Do your job, and I’ll do mine. Or were you under the impression that F.O.W.L. rewards agents who complain about their assignments?”

Her grip loosened a fraction, enough for Steelbeak to yank himself away. He fought the urge to rub his beak, feeling like a wounded animal when he did so. It wasn’t like he could feel much of anything beyond the seam where the metal met flesh and feathers. It tended to ache under the weight of his prosthesis, and significantly more so when it was wretched around. His face burned now, though more from embarrassment than pain. 

“Yeah, whatever,” he muttered, feeling pathetic as he backed down. Not that Heron was wrong, as much as he hated to admit it. He didn’t fully understand F.O.W.L.’s command structure yet, with less than a year to find his footing. Back when he was fighting there were no rules. There was no such thing as teams, friendships were a joke, and one's loyalty lied solely with their owner, everyone else being fair game. Steelbeak poisoned, betrayed, and beat his rivals into submission to become the best and most sought after fighter. That was how he survived. 

But now, however grudgingly, Steelbeak had a partner. And he needed to learn the rules in order to survive here, too. 

He watched Heron unlock the hidden safe in their wall, placing the briefcase with their latest spoils inside. They’d be needing it in a few hours to bribe some Coopan official in exchange for unfettered access to their airspace. 

“How long is command making us stay out in the boonies anyway?” Steelbeak said, crossing his arms as he leaned back against Heron’s desk. 

She glanced over her shoulder, smirking. “Why? Are you looking forward to seeing your little friend again?” 

Within his folded arms, Steelbeak’s hands tightened into white-knuckled fists. It did nothing to prevent a pang of longing hit him square in the gut. “Don’t be stupid,” he growled, turning his head to glower at nothing and tried not to think of the red of Fethry’s coat. “I’m tired of all this moving around. I’d like to sleep in my own bed if it’s all the same to you.”

Heron rolled her eyes as she shut the safe. “You sound like a child.” 

“And you sound like my grandma,” Steelbeak shot back. “At least before the jewelry store heist. Hard to say much of anything from federal—”

“Get out!” Heron snapped, pointing sharply at the door. “You want something to do? Stand guard in an empty hallway. It’s the perfect use of your skills.”

“Fine,” Steelbeak hissed, chafing under his lackluster comeback. He pushed off the edge of the desk with a huff. “I was gonna go crazy staring at these dumb walls for another second anyway.” 

“Out!”

“I’m going!” he shouted, edging around her, wary as her prosthesis began to hum. She’d already grabbed his beak; he didn’t fancy becoming target practice too. 

He slammed the door behind him with far more force than necessary, drowning out whatever vitriol Heron threw at his back. The hallway was quiet, empty like Heron had said. So was the entire building—a F.O.W.L. safehouse, and a cheap one at that, located in a rougher part of town. Garbage littered the corners and the wallpaper might have been light blue once but was now badly stained and peeling. A window at the end of the hall had a cracked pane and was too filthy to see through. 

Steelbeak fished around in his pockets until he unearthed a crumbled pack of cigarettes and his lighter. He didn’t smoke often, since he wasn’t a complete moron even before his flashy new gig. But it gave him something to do and the burn of the nicotine helped clear his mind. 

Or at least it usually did, until he found himself thinking that Fethry probably wouldn’t like it that he smoked. 

He’d be respectful about it, no question. Express his concerns for Steelbeak’s health because he _was_ concerned. He would probably go out of his way to make an entire slideshow presentation on the dangers of smoking and be utterly sincere and helpful about it in a way Steelbeak didn’t deserve, knowingly wrecking his lungs as he was. Knowingly pushing Fethry away as he was. 

“Stupid,” he muttered, digging the heel of his palm into his forehead, mindful of dropping ash in his feathers. “Stupid, stupid, stupid.”

He’d made his decision. F.O.W.L. was his last hope at a life outside bars, and between Fethry and his job there was no contest. Steelbeak couldn’t let himself get distracted. 

Deciding he was going to patrol the perimeter because that sounded official and like something he should be doing, he marched down the hallway. With his first step, he put out his cigarette by crushing most of it still unlit under his designer soles. 

  
  


It was late when they landed back in Duckburg. Late enough that the sky was already beginning to lighten with pre-dawn, and the ocean was still and gray. 

The base remained quiet and sparse save a skeleton security crew. After jetting back and forth across the globe for a month, Steelbeak had jet lag on top of his jet lag, and felt so wired he didn’t know if he wanted to go three rounds with the gym’s punching bags or pass out on the nearest horizontal surface. 

It was also late enough that the labs should have been dark and deserted, but his luck had never been of the reliable sort. 

He found the door to the marine laboratory wide open, brilliant white light spilling out across the concrete floor and walls of the darkened hallway. His quarters were in the next sector of the base, beyond the science division. All he had to do was walk past. 

Hiking his garment bag over his shoulder with a scowl, Steelbeak ducked his head and set a brisk pace forward. 

Just because a light was on this late didn’t mean it was...who he thought it might be. In all likelihood, one of the many pale, bug eyed scientists under their payroll could’ve found a faster way to refine uranium or weaponize the common cold and was burning the midnight oil in order to perfect it. 

Without hesitation, he walked through the splay of light, staring straight ahead, and still it partially blinded him. Steelbeak crossed back into the relative darkness of the dimly lit hallway, no worse for wear. One step away from the lab, then two, then three, and still it remained quiet. Four steps, five steps. Nothing happened, and the buzzing of his frayed nerves began to abate. He must’ve been right about the pencil pusher in the lab. 

A tremendous crash at his back had Steelbeak whirling around, dropping his garment bag and raising his fists, more than in the mood to channel his agitation into pummeling some hapless intruder. The hallway before him remained empty, though the crash had escalated into a cacophony of sound. With a jolt of alarm, he realized that it was coming from inside the open laboratory. 

The clamor came to an end as a figure stumbled out of the doorway, backlit by the lab’s harsher lights. Short and lean under a baggy coat, the figure glanced down the opposite hallway before lifting their head to lock eyes with Steelbeak. 

Fethry beamed, the light spilling out of the laboratory splitting his face into equal halves of gold and black shadow. 

“Steelbeak,” he said, out of breath, “you’re back!”

“Uh, yeah,” Steelbeak replied, feeling as though an elephant had trodden on his chest. “You, uh, knocking off a marching band in there?”

He felt like an idiot as the words tripped off his tongue. Fethry wasn’t supposed to _be here_ , not yet. Steelbeak wasn’t supposed to have this conversation until he felt in control of himself, had a good night’s sleep, slipped into a crisp, wrinkle-free suit, actually prepared himself to see Fethry again, all bright and wide-eyed and close enough to touch. The thought of looking so unkempt while he did this, threw Fethry’s friendship back in his face, made him want to run away. 

Fethry blinked, utterly unaware of Steelbeak’s inner dilemma. “Huh? Oh, oh the noise! No, no—well, not exactly. I wanted to see if other forms of marine life responded to music the same way my team does, so I went out and rented a dozen musical instruments. So far, I’ve determined that a c sharp on the clarinet makes a sea urchin’s spines move clockwise, while an f flat on the trumpet makes them move counterclockwise!”

The more Fethry talked, the more the comfort of familiarity ached and the more pathetic he felt. An entire month and he was still pining after someone he had no future with. 

Steelbeak bent over to pick up his garment bag as Fethry continued to speak. 

“Where were you anyway? Nobody around here seemed to be able to give me a straight answer.” Fethry tilted his head to the side, expression curious, guileless, or at least outwardly so. There was an unfamiliar tension in his shoulders, tightness in his face. He’d been worried and was trying to hide it. 

“Y’know, here and there,” Steelbeak replied. “Heron had to meet with a bunch of science bigwigs and I tagged along for security. Didn’t really get the chance to go sightseeing.”

Fethry brightened. “Well, now that you’re back maybe we can do a little sightseeing here? I know Duckburg isn’t very exciting, but a lot can change in five years!”

Steelbeak clenched his jaw, pretending if he did it hard enough he would feel pain. “Can’t,” he said shortly. He even shrugged. “I need to focus on my job. You should too. F.L.O.W. isn’t paying us to screw around on their dime.” 

Not Steelbeak at least. Fethry’s very job title was a farce. 

“O-oh.” Fethry faltered, his smile flickering and fading. “Yes, of course. You’re right.” He took a step back, rubbing his arm. Despite his height, Steelbeak had never thought of Fethry as small before. Now, it was the only word that came to mind. 

He was on the brink of making a run for it, his canned excuse already spewed past his beak, when Fethry spoke again. What he said froze Steelbeak to the spot. “If this is about what happened at the amphitheater, I’m sorry if I was out of line. The last thing I would ever want to do is-is offend you or make you feel uncomfortable. I...I’d like to go back to being friends? If that’s okay?”

Fethry smiled, nervous and utterly sincere, and Steelbeak felt numb at the thought of never seeing that smile again. And he wouldn’t, not if he wanted to keep the opportunities F.O.W.L. had given him. Money, power, prestige. Fethry’s smile couldn’t be worth that. 

“I should hit the sack,” Steelbeak drawled, cracking his neck so he didn’t have to see the disappointment on Fethry’s face. “Learned about this little thing called jet lag, and it’s a killer.” 

“Yeah,” Fethry said quietly, as Steelbeak very carefully didn’t look in his direction. “Yeah. I should turn in, too.”

Steelbeak made to turn away when belated realization slithered into the cavern of his ribs, sickening certainty wrapping ice cold around his lungs. Before he could stop himself, he ruined his neat exit with a question he was afraid he already knew the answer to. 

“You were waiting up for me?” 

He looked back at Fethry—he couldn’t help himself. It made a frightening amount of sense, even for someone like Steelbeak. The light on in the lab despite the lateness of the hour. Fethry’s worried, sleepless face. He wouldn’t have any idea when Steelbeak would be back. Fethry had been waiting for him. Fethry had been worried for _him_. 

Like Steelbeak, Fethry wore his heart on his sleeve. But unlike Steelbeak, who was all vindictiveness and bald attempts at saving face, Fethry was honest in everything he did. Even now as he blinked in surprise, Steelbeak knew he wouldn’t deny it. 

“Y-yes,” Fethry answered and though Steelbeak had expected it, still it came as a blow. He began to smile, sleepy-eyed and soft, and for Steelbeak that was the final straw. 

He would be the first to admit that he was no actor; why wield subterfuge when a fist would do just as well? But the thought of raising a hand to Fethry in violence terrified Steelbeak to a core he didn’t think he still had, and made him want to run far, far away. 

Still, the problem persisted. Fethry’s gaze weighed heavily on him, damning him, so he let his voice grow cold and aloof, allowing an old familiar cruelty to harden his gaze as he crushed the hope in Fethry’s. 

“Don’t make it a habit. F.L.O.W. doesn’t need you falling asleep with your head in a fishtank.” 

So as to not be misconstrued, Steelbeak didn’t hesitate before turning his back on Fethry. Though he intended the order to be given with finality, he only made it a few steps before Fethry’s voice rose up behind him, thick with uncertainty but growing stronger. 

“Steelbeak, I’m grateful for this opportunity, you know that. I-I would never fall behind on my work. But you’re right, the body needs seven to nine hours of sleep to function at its best, and on good nights I’ve barely been getting half of that! I won’t wait for you anymore either, if that’s what you’d prefer. I just wanted to be sure you were alright—”

Steelbeak rounded on him, tasting bile in his throat. “Stop talking!” He watched Fethry’s beak close with a clack and forced himself to press on. “Jeez, I don’t care what you do. I’m not your babysitter anymore! Sleep, don’t sleep, whatever. Stop wasting my time.”

He wrenched himself away scarcely after uttering the last word, heart pounding painfully against his sternum. His speed did nothing to spare him the full brunt of Fethry’s gutted expression. 

Steelbeak didn’t let it stop him, hiking his garment bag higher over his shoulder as he marched resolutely toward his quarters. His footfalls were the only sound in the hallway. If Fethry had spoken again, it would have been impossible to miss. 

The hallway remained silent at his back, oppressively so. 

_Mission accomplished,_ Steelbeak thought, fighting the urge to put his fist through a wall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay with the chapter! To make up for it, there’ll be more Fethry next time


End file.
